If cupcakes could talk, they would tell you their ingredients.
Hannes Harms, via designboom

Would you let a man who created a piece of furniture called the "scum chair" anywhere near your food? I would, as long as the man is design engineering student Hannes Harms from the Royal College of Art in London.

Harms has hatched a concept called NutriSmart that melds the tracking power of radio frequency identification (RFID) tags with the yumminess of Twinkies, Cheez Wiz, or just about any other food product you can imagine. The edible tags could hold information about where the food was grown or shipped from, what the ingredients are, how far it has traveled, and what the nutritional content is.

The NutriSmart prototype includes a smart plate that reads the RFID tags in the food. It can tell you how many calories it is costing you (150 for that Twinkie) and how it stacks up nutritionally in your diet.

Harms imagines a kitchen with a smart refrigerator that tells you when your milk is going sour or that it's time to replace that aging bottle of ketchup you haven't touched in a year. It could also be used to alert allergy sufferers when a potentially dangerous ingredient is present.

About the author

Freelance writer Amanda C. Kooser covers gadgets and tech news with a twist for CNET's Crave blog. When not wallowing in weird gadgets and iPad apps for cats, she can be found tinkering with her 1956 DeSoto.
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